Thompson Falls Hydropower Relicensing
GEI is supporting NorthWestern Energy with a FERC relicensing strategy, preparation of FERC filings, technical studies, and review. We managed the preparation of the Pre-Application Document, Proposed Study Plan, Revised Study Plan, Initial Study Report, Updated Study Report, Draft License Application, and Final License Application. As the lead consultant, GEI is responsible for managing the work of other technical consultants and integrating all the technical work into reports that meet FERC requirements.
GEI is also assisting with stakeholder consultation with both regulatory agencies and the public. The work includes maintaining a SharePoint site with a repository of comments submitted, developing responses to comments, and maintaining the relicensing project mailing list.
In a technical role, GEI assisted NorthWestern with the development and implementation of studies on fisheries, water quality, aquatic biology, terrestrial biology, geology, and engineering. Our team also developed a fish telemetry database, used for post processing of radio tracking data collected for the fish behavior studies. In addition, we conducted a tailrace hydraulic evaluation using 3D computational fluid dynamics modeling for the purpose of assessing fish access to the upstream fish passage facility.